China’s national rail operator told The Paper that it had found several train tunnels cutting through the hilly terrain of southwest China’s Guizhou province to be substandard.

According to The Paper, China Railway has reprimanded four companies involved in the construction, supervision, and design of the Guizhou section, as well as a third-party inspection firm, and issued various penalties. The main contractor held responsible, China Railway 20 Bureau Group, has been barred from bidding on national rail projects for the next year and will be held liable for 90 percent of the cost of repairs, while two other companies will shoulder 5 percent each.

A local news blogger in Guizhou was among the first to expose the route’s safety issues on Monday. In a Weibo microblog post that has since been deleted, he shared photos of shoddy construction in one of the tunnels and leaked internal documents from China Railway noting several accidents between June and July that prompted the company to start an investigation. The blogger also accused rail contractors of corruption. […] [Source]

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